In the South China Morning Post, reporter Frederick Yeung provides the latest on Hong Kong’s daily newspaper wars. Not since the infamous Jimmy Lai, the barrel-chested and feisty publisher and editor of the popular Apple Daily newspaper dramatic departure four years ago from Hong Kong to Taiwan have the local media dished so much about itself. Yeung writes, “A war between free newspapers will start today with the launch of Sing Tao News Corp's Headline Daily. The new tabloid will hit the streets this morning with an initial print run of 400,000 copies.”
Hong Kong retains a rich and notorious publishing history and it lives for newspaper competition and sometimes a few editors have even gotten bloody.
On the short ferry ride from Central to Kowloon, locals and expats can choose among 28 Chinese-language dailies, English-language dailies, eight bilingual dailies and five in other languages in Hong Kong.
The Sing Tao building with its emblazoned huge red logo, situated about ten minutes away from the Kowloon Bay MTR station may not be visible in Beijing, but their editorial pro-China message resonates.
Sing Tao newspaper was established in 1938 by Aw Boon Haw, the founder of the Tiger Balm ointment empire. Sally Aw Sian, the scion’s daughter, lacked her father's business acumen and borrowed heavily over the decades to meet pressing financial obligations.
In the 1960s regional offices were established in San Francisco, New York and Los Angeles to publish Sing Tao Daily in North America. By the late 1980s, the daughter, facing a financial crisis, received a substantial financial bailout from the Chinese government.
In January of 2001, the Global China Technology Group, a Hong Kong-based company chaired by Ho Tsu-Kwok, acquired the controlling shares of Sing Tao's holdings.
Ho Tsu-Kwok maintains close ties with Beijing and has served as a member of China's National Political Consultative Conference. In May of 2001 Ho cooperated with China's state-run Xinhua News Agency to establish an information service company known as Xinhua Online.
Sing Tao’s senior management, in response to the global trends of free metropolitan tabloids, and specifically to the impressive advertising revenue of Metro, the free Hong Kong daily which was launched three years ago, with its daily circulation of 300,000 copies, is committing its vast enterprise and resources to this new launch.
Enter Headline Daily, the newest free newspaper, launched on July 12, targeting Hong Kong’s blue-collar population. The contents covers in a quick-read tab format, local and international news as well as information on business, entertainment and leisure.
In a press release issed this week, Sing Tao claims that an average of 400,000 copies of the paper will be distributed on Monday to Friday at over 600 busy points including major transportation hubs, residential and commercial areas all over Hong Kong.
"We will not affect the business of traditional broadsheet newspapers in Hong Kong," said Charles Ho Tsu-kwok, chairman of Sing Tao. He has indicated in press releases that the circulation of local paid newspapers might fall by 3 per cent to 4 per cent as the free daily entered the market.
Credit Pelle Anderson, founder of design company A4, for the measureable impact of the tabloid in global markets. Anderson introduced Metro, the world’s largest newspaper publisher, which was launched in 1995. It is published in 42 daily editions in 63 major cities worldwide. Here, is a quote from Anderson on the future of newspapers, including the trend toward tabloidization.
"The publishers must understand that they are no longer in a daily newspaper market, nor a media market: they are in a time market. They are competing with everything that eats into the available free time of their customers. People do not have the time to read the thick “daily everything,” states the global designer.
The Sing Tao Daily (星島日報) is Hong Kong's second largest Chinese language newspaper and it also provides free online news at www.singtao.com. It’s a global brand. Sing Tao News Corporation Group Limited daily international newspaper, Sing Tao remains the anchor for the media corporation. The group's English tabloid newspaper, The Standard, has been through several high-profile transformations and its banner proclaims it as “China’s Business Newspaper" but this tab only offers marginal competition against the South China Morning Post.
Few dispute the media influence of Sing Tao in Hong Kong with its Chinese and English daily newspapers. But there are some pundits, who advocate that the industry with 'tabloid or no tabloid will not save the day for the mainstream publisher.
In a recent issue of the American Journalism Review, Philip Meyer, who has studied the newspaper industry for three decades, forecasts darkness at the end of the tunnel. If present readership trends continue indefinitely, says the University of North Carolina professor, the last daily newspaper reader will check out in 2044. October 2044, to be exact. "I use that as an attention-getting device," says Meyer, whose latest book, "The Vanishing Newspaper: Saving Journalism in the Information Age," spells out the bad news in elaborate detail. "It's shocking, but that's what the numbers say."
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